{"id":13126,"date":"2012-08-23T10:00:29","date_gmt":"2012-08-23T17:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingvancouver.ca\/?p=13126"},"modified":"2013-01-21T07:09:26","modified_gmt":"2013-01-21T15:09:26","slug":"the-vancouver-historical-society","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/vancouver\/2012\/08\/23\/the-vancouver-historical-society\/","title":{"rendered":"The Vancouver Historical Society"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Houdini hanging upside down on the Sun Tower in 1923. Image courtesy of the City of Vancouver Archives, Port N100.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

A few years ago, Bruce McIntyre Watson was checking the Vancouver Historical Society\u2019s info line and found an enquiry from the president of the Lions Club in Diggers Rest, an outer suburb of Melbourne.<\/p>\n

He was looking for the plane that Harry Houdini flew in 1910\u2014in what some believe was Australia\u2019s first successful flight, and wondered if it had made its way to Vancouver.<\/p>\n

The Society gets queries from all around the world. People wanting to know who\u2019s living in a certain house, if a building is still standing, or just recently, where a man from San Diego could access prison records about his bank robbing ancestor.<\/p>\n

\u201cEssentially we are just a referral service,\u201d says Bruce, but members know the most obscure things, and the Houdini connection intrigued him.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Houdini flying his plane in Digger\u2019s Rest, Melbourne in 1910.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With help from the Vancouver Public Library\u2019s Andrew Martin, Bruce found that Houdini had purchased a French Voisin bi-plane for $5,000 and shipped it from Marseilles to Australia, where he was performing to huge crowds. More research revealed that the plane was crated back to England and disappeared from public record in 1913.<\/p>\n

Bruce couldn\u2019t find the plane, but he did make an interesting discovery. While Houdini\u2019s first recorded visit to Vancouver was in March 1923, he visited Vancouver with his wife in June 1910.<\/p>\n

The Story of Vancouver<\/h3>\n

The Society does much more than act as a referral service. It\u2019s mission is to \u201cpreserve and promote Vancouver\u2019s history.\u201d Increasingly that interest comes from young people. It was some of those questions that convinced Bruce to write \u201cThe story of Vancouver\u201d for the website which he has sprinkled with quotes and anecdotes from the Major Matthew\u2019s collection at the Vancouver Archives, and dozens of archival photos.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was no overall coherent story of Vancouver,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd we are more than a bunch of stories piled one on top of the other.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tours and Speakers<\/strong><\/p>\n

Every third Thursday of the month (except in summer), the society hosts a speaker. Held at the Museum of Vancouver in Vanier Park, the meetings are free and open to everyone and regularly draw over 100 people. Over the years speakers have included Vancouver Sun reporters David Baines (Vancouver Stock Exchange) and Kim Bolan (crime and terrorism), John Atkin (the Chinatown tunnel myth), and Don Luxton (top 10 endangered sites).<\/p>\n

The Society holds walking tours for its members and they\u2019ve been some unusual ones: a tour of downtown brothels by the Vancouver Police Department, a labour history tour, a behind the scenes at the Orpheum Theatre, and a tour of Purdy\u2019s chocolate factory.<\/p>\n

I’ve recently joined the board of the Society and I’m finding out all sorts of fun facts.\u00a0Did you know that William Henry Pratt helped build the PNE in 1910? Apparently he was a lousy carpenter and he\u00a0left for Hollywood soon after and changed his name to Boris Karloff.<\/p>\n

The website is loaded with information at http:\/\/vancouver-historical-society.ca\/<\/a><\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

Eve Lazarus is a writer with a passion for history and heritage houses. She is the author of At Home with History: the secrets of Greater Vancouver’s Heritage Houses, a member of the North Vancouver District Heritage Commission, and blogs obsessively about buildings and their genealogies at www.blog.evelazarus.com<\/a>. Her next book \u201cSensational Victoria\u201d with house stories of Victoria\u2019s murders, ghosts, brothels, artists and sea captains (not necessarily in that order) will be published in November.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A few years ago, Bruce McIntyre Watson was checking the Vancouver Historical Society\u2019s info line and found an enquiry from the president of the Lions Club in Diggers Rest, an outer suburb of Melbourne. 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